characteristics of ideal training environments,

to the methods for fostering motivation

by providing both emotional support
and attainable training tasks of a suitable difficulty
level. This theoretical framework has
several implications.
It implies that if someone is interested
in the upper limits of human performance
and the most effective training to achieve
the highest attainable levels, they should
study the training techniques and performance
limits of experts who have spent
their entire life maximizing their performance.
This assumption also implies that the
study of expert performance will provide
us with the best current evidence on what
is humanly possible to achieve with today’s
methods of training and how these elite performers
are able to achieve their highest levels
of performance. Given that performance
levels are increasing every decade in most
domains of expertise, scientists will need to
work with elite performers and their coaches
to discover jointly the ever-increasing levels
of improved performance.
The framework has implications for education
and professional training of performance
for all the preliminary levels that
lead up to the expert levels in professional
domains of expertise. By examining how
the prospective expert performers attained
lower levels of achievement, we should
be able to develop practice environments
and foster learning methods that help people
to attain the fundamental representations
of the tasks and the self-regulatory
skills that were necessary for the prospective
experts to advance their learning to
higher levels.
With the rapid changes in the relevant
knowledge and techniques required for most
jobs, nearly everyone will have to continue
their learning and even intermittently
relearn aspects of their professional skills.
The life-long quest for improved adaptation
to task demands will not be limited to
experts anymore. We will all need to adopt
the characteristics and the methods of the
expert performers who continuously strive
to attain and maintain their best level of
achievement.
References
Anderson, J. R. (Ed.) (1981). Cognitive skills and
their acquisition. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum .
Aristotle (2000). Generation of animals (Translated
by A. L. Pick and first published in 1942).
Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univesity Press.
Barnes, J. (2000). Aristotle: A very short introduction.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Becker,G. S. (2002). The age of human capital. In
E. P. Lazear (Ed.), Education in the twenty-first
century (pp. 3–8). Stanford,CA: Hoover Institution
Press.
B´edard, J. (1991). Expertise and its relation to
audit decision quality. Contemporary Accounting
Research, 8, 198–222.
Benner, P. E. (1984). From novice to expert –
Excellence and power in clinical nursing practice.
Menlo Park, CA: Addison-Wesley.
Bloom, B. S. (Ed.) (1985a). Developing talent in
young people. New York: Ballantine Books.
Bloom, B. S. (1985b). Generalizations about talent
development. In B. S. Bloom (Ed.), Developing
talent in young people (pp. 507–549). New
York: Ballantine Books.
Bloomfield, J. (2004). Australia’s sporting success:
The inside story. Sydney, Australia: University
of South Wales Press.
Bolger, F., & Wright, G. (1992). Reliability and
validity in expert judgment. In G. Wright and
F. Bolger (Eds.), Expertise and decision support
(pp. 47–76). New York: Plenum.
Bryan,W. L., & Harter, N. (1899). Studies on the
telegraphic language: The acquisition of a hierarchy
of habits. Psychological Review, 6, 345–
375.
Camerer, C. F., & Johnson, E. J. (1991).
The process-performance paradox in expert
judgment: How can the experts know so much
and predict so badly? In K. A. Ericsson and
J. Smith (Eds.), Towards a general theory of
expertise: Prospects and limits (pp. 195–217).
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Chase,W.G. (Ed.) (1973). Visual information processing.
New York: Academic Press.
Chase,W. G., & Simon, H. A. (1973). The mind’s
eye in chess. In W. G. Chase (Ed.), Visual
information processing (pp. 215–281). New York:
Academic Press.
Chi, M. T. H., Feltovich, P. J., & Glaser, R. (1981).
Categorization and representation of physics
problems by experts and novices. Cognitive Science,
5 , 121–15 2.